So I’ve been here a whole week now, getting to know the church the city and started to get involved in the work of the church. The majority of my time has been spent in something called the Hope Centre. Its a drop-in centre for the those that are lonely, need help with children or just want a sanctuary to relax in. It’s aim was to fill a need of the community – a place for hope. Its also a place to meet a practical need.

The ‘Baby Basket’ as they call it is service they offer to poor parents who are struggling to feed their babies or even buy nappies. The service allows parents to come in, which are normally single mothers, and obtain free formula, nappies and baby wipes.

I’ve seen, chatted with and occasionally prayed with some people who carry with them a really difficult story. If you spend enough time with them, you sometimes get the privilege of hearing it. One man who has been coming in a few times finally opened up just at closing time. He is blind in one eye, has a shattered vertebra he can’t afford to fix, he has had a recent heart attack and a dodgy valve, he has arthritis and he had just found out he has cancer. To make things worse, he has just lost his disability benefits because he got back-paid some pension money, so exceeded the limits of external earnings. I’m aware sometimes these stories can be twisted to their own point of view, but nonetheless, this man is in a terrible state.

The worse part about it, is it felt like there’s nothing that you can do – I can’t pay to get his spine fixed, I can’t help that he is blind. I don’t even know the Canadian system to be able to advise what to do about the benefits problem. It really was tough listening with no answers.

People say that having someone to talk to helps, someone that they can offload and share their problems with. No even expecting them to get fixed. He didn’t expect his cancer to get cured, but his need was loneliness. He was dealing with this all on his own. Then again, I can’t even aid his loneliness; I’m only there a couple times a week, and I’ll be off soon enough.

So what is the point of the Hope centre? Its not curing cancer, its not even fulfilling a simple problem of loneliness. What it is doing, is praying for others. We prayed for that man. And he had tears in his eyes after we prayed. The Hope Centre isn’t a place to solve life’s worries, but its a place to bring hope. It points to God when people need Him. God is hope, God can heal all those problems – He doesn’t always, in fact, He rarely does. Why? I don’t know. But He brings hope beyond the here and now. That’s the marvel of God in a lost world. When everything seems beyond hope, God brings hope to the hopeless, love to the unloved, Godliness to the ungodly. Its God at work.

All content provided on this website, included but not limited to: articles, images, videos, essays, papers are copyright Christopher McKirgan, unless otherwise explicitly stated. All opinions expressed on this site are strictly opinions of the given author and should be treated as such. All given code samples are copyright under GLP copyleft license unless otherwise explicitly stated. Some content on this website is contributed by third parties, all copyright ownership of such content belongs to its respective owners. This website uses cookies, and may collect data used for essential website functionality and for use with traffic analytics; by using the website you agree for such data to be gathered.

If you wish to contact Kirgy, please simply leave a comment using an the email address you wish to be contacted on, and Kirgy will respond to you personally. Happy hacking.